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Jim Flaherty knew that politicians risk more than most of us

Flowers and a card of sympathy are placed in honour of former Finance Minister Jim Flaherty on a desk in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Friday, April 11, 2014.. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred ChartrandPhoto: THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand

After Jim Flaherty succumbed to a heart attack in his Ottawa condo on Thursday, the political community in Ottawa took time to mourn him.

Shocked MPs walked across the aisle in the House of Commons to embrace and comfort one another. Stunned House leaders quickly agreed to adjourn for the day. Politicians in the Ontario legislature, where Flaherty ably worked for many years, followed suit.

A political giant in leprechaun form had passed away, and it hit everybody hard. Someone who had been a big, friendly presence in our national life was suddenly gone, which sent a chill through many a heart, and put a tear in many an eye.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair struggled to stop from breaking down as he gave an emotional tribute to another Montreal Irishman who knew how to put his elbows up.

Colleagues comforted Labour Minister Kellie Leitch, who administered CPR to Flaherty as they waited for paramedics to arrive at his condo. Everyone expressed their condolences to Flaherty’s widow, Christine Elliott, and their three boys.

Staffers repaired to pubs near the Hill to raise a glass of Guinness to their old boss.

Ryan Tenta, of Vancouver, signs a public book of condolences in honour of former Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in the rotunda of the Hall of Honor on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Friday, April 11, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand

Meanwhile, across the Ottawa River in Gatineau, Sen. Patrick Brazeau sat in a jail cell, where he would spend the night after an early morning assault arrest at his girlfriend’s home, the latest step on a journey that will now take him to rehab, and, I hope, recovery.

I was at my desk, writing about Brazeau’s woes, when the news about Flaherty turned everything upside down.

Aaron Wherry of Maclean’s soon posted a speech Flaherty gave at the University of Western Ontario in 2011.

“Public service is good for you,” Flaherty told the students. “You will have opportunities to change the world around you in varying ways and to different degrees, large and small. You will get opportunities and to use your talents to implement your thoughts and beliefs. In concert with others, accomplishments will follow. Great adventure this, for disappointments and failure will follow also. Boredom, however, is not on the agenda.”

He went on to quote some lines from a speech former U.S. president Teddy Roosevelt gave in Paris in 1910, praising “the man who is actually in the arena.” Even when he fails, the speech goes, he “at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

I first heard the speech quoted by Brian Mulroney in 2009 at a Montreal celebration of the 25th anniversary of his 1984 election victory, when I took it to be a veiled reference to legal difficulties he then faced.

They capture something of the peril of public life, and it doesn’t hurt those of us on the sidelines to remember that politicians do take greater risks than the rest of us.

There is no profession that offers greater opportunities for public humiliation. If Patrick Brazeau had stayed in Maniwaki, where he grew up, few people outside his immediate circle would know of his difficulties, and reporters would not have had cause to nose through his personal belongings.

I would not like, these days, to be in the expensive shoes of Dimitri Soudas, who recently left the Conservative party after violating a commitment not to interfere in his girlfriend’s nomination battle; nor in the shoes of that girlfriend, MP Eve Adams, whose political career may be about to come to an abrupt halt.

Helena Guergis and Rahim Jaffer went from the charmed circle of power to political exile, the result of a media-government pile-on that left them publicly humiliated.

A $16 order of room service orange juice brought Bev Oda’s career to an end.

Flowers and a card of sympathy are placed in honour of former Finance Minister Jim Flaherty on a desk in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Friday, April 11, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand

Stephane Dion’s disastrous leadership of the Liberal party left him looking like a loser, until Michael Ignatieff brought the party to even lower depths.

Often, people in politics are brought low for good reason, but sometimes they are the victims of understandable errors, magnified by scoop-hungry journalists and political rivals.

It is a good system, because the price of power is scrutiny, and our leaders live in fear of humiliation, but it sure looks like a tough life.

The 24-hour news cycle and the spread of social media is making it even tougher. Every day I see people online aim vicious personal attacks against politicians.

As a politician complained in the British comedy The Thick of It: “Have you ever Googled your name? It’s like opening your door to a room where everyone tells you how s— you are.”

As we pause to pay our respects to an honourable servant of the people, it’s a good time to recall that our system of government depends on a steady supply of hardy souls climbing into the arena. We ought to respect their courage, and leaven our justice with mercy when they fall.